All posts tagged: nyx

Quick Tips for Bright Eyes

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There are two basic tricks for an immediate bright-eyed, Disney Princess effect, and those involve a light-colored liner on the lower lashline or an inner corner highlight. For that extra-bright, wide-eyed look, use both tricks. THE SCIENCE BEHIND A NUDE LINER The first time I found out about a bright liner on the lower lash line was when I was watching an episode of America’s Next Top Model. I wasn’t so convinced when Tyra said to use a white eyeliner, so it was a tip that went ignored—until people started talking about swapping it out for a nude eyeliner. Placing a light, neutral liner on your lower lash line makes you appear more awake because it cancels out the red on the inner rim of your eyes, without defining it the way a black or brown eyeliner would. It creates the illusion of bigger, brighter eyes, because there is continuity with the white part of your eye. This is why a light-colored eyeliner sort of creates a bigger eye look, where as a black or …

Ace of Base: Making Eyeshadow Stay Put on your Oily Lids

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One of my greatest frustrations when I was starting out with makeup was eyeshadow. I think that’s why I was so ecstatic to find out about primers. They made crappy eyeshadow look good and stay put. I eventually found some awesome eyeshadows that work well, even without a primer, but I couldn’t not wear primer once I started. Eye primers are basically the magic glue that bonds your eyeshadow to your eyelids. If your eyelids are prone to oiling up, a good primer or base will prevent your eyeshadow from ‘creasing’—or bunching up in unattractive lines, around your eye folds—and will get you through the day with pretty flawless makeup. There are a lot of good ones out in the market today, and I’ll share with you a few of my favorites. For your standard, dries-down-translucent eyeshadow primer, my top picks are Urban Decay Primer Potion and NARS Pro-Prime Smudgeproof Eyeshadow Base. These have worked the best on my eyes so far. Other alternatives are the e.l.f. Mineral Eyeshadow Primer (though it didn’t agree with …

Drugstore Finds: NYX Jumbo Eye Pencils

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The NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Milk was made popular a few years ago by YouTube beauty gurus, and I can see why. It’s a chubby pencil that dispenses a rich, white opaque coating in one swipe. Fans of colored eyeshadows that really pop, rejoice! I have a few others in Lavender, Oyster, and Pacific, and while all of them are inferior to Milk in the department of Making Eyeshadows Pop, they’re great for other things. I swatched three eyeshadows over each of the Jumbo Eye Pencil Swatches to observe their performance as a base: On top, I have Addiction’s Sandbar, and to me, it’s a bit too light to arrive at any sort of conclusion. The next row is made by a rust-colored shadow, and you can see the pink tones come out more when it’s over Oyster. The last row is a swipe of a cool blue shadow, 203 by Art Deco, and you can also see the nuance of the change shade the most over Oyster once again. I love Milk, especially …

Stash Shopping No. 3

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Hey everyone! Here’s another edition of Stash Shopping, which is when I look over my current collection and commit to use some selected items for an entire week. I’m on my third week, and it’s been fun. I actually asked the last time if you wanted to see some looks I wore using the selected items and received a mostly favorable response, so before I get into this week’s “haulage,” let me share some looks I made the past week, mostly using the bareMinerals READY 8.0 Eyeshadow Palette in The Cocktail Hour (reviewed here): Just a disclaimer, I work as a freelance writer and graphic designer, so I don’t wear makeup everyday. 🙂 For this first look, I used the coral (Spiked), the taupe-y color (Invite Only), and the purple (Swanky), in that order from the inner corner all the way across the lid. I wore this to a meeting and some errands. I used the Revlon Mineral Blush (Roseberry), and the Maybelline Lipstick (Chestnut) that was also in the box, but I topped it …

Sayonara, Lipstick Week: My Lipstick Collection

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I saved the “best” for last. Here’s my embarrassing lipstick collection. Do I need all of it? Probably not. I think I have a nice, round collection, however, and I don’t own too many dupes. I know this because I tried to make a dupe post for Lipstick Week and failed. Ahem. I keep most of my lipsticks inside a small MUJI bag that I’ve fitted with the plastic containers. I put this bag inside a drawer because I like to keep the top of my desk relatively clean. Honestly, this isn’t the most ideal situation, but it works. Other lip products like glosses and stuff are in a clear jar. Others like balms, lip butters, lip tars, etc. are in a small drawer on my desk. OK, so let’s talk about the lipstick. Here’s pretty much everything I have: I know it looks like a lot, but I really try and clean out this collection and see if I haven’t used a lipstick in x number of months. I also try to keep the …

Lipstick Week, Day 5: MLBB Magic

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For Day 5 of Lipstick Week, I aim to tackle the ubiquitous (at least in the beauty community) acronym: MLBB. If you don’t know what MLBB means, are you new? JK, MLBB basically means “My Lips But Better.” It pertains to a color that is very close to the wearer’s natural lip color, though with a slight improvement to it. It pretty much means what it literally means. I think MLBB colors are deeply personal and can obviously vary from person to person. Some people have to make numerous attempts at finding their MLBB shade, while others have theirs fall onto their laps! I can’t really tell you which MLBB would be right for you, but here are some that I feel like are mine. Chanel Rouge Coco Shine in Boy. Chanel’s Boy delivers a sheer pinky wash of color that lets your natural color peek through. It’s very beautiful and I guess ups the pink tones of your lip color and adds a bit of shine. This is an old, funnily-lit picture, but I …